Silvia Berger Ziauddin

At the beginning of the 1980s, global aftermath studies prompted new perceptions of a nuclear war’s long-term effects on Planet Earth. Focusing on the Swiss ‘Weiterleben’ (‘to live on’) study, which translated these findings into a local context, the paper sheds light on the intertwined history of global politics, science, national security debates, and nuclear fear. It reveals important socio-political and epistemic shifts in the 1980s. Even in countries with comprehensive civil defence systems like Switzerland, the idea that a nuclear war was manageable came to an end; new forms of planning and types of scientific reasoning evolved that superseded ‘Cold War rationality’; and, finally, emotions became a crucial political factor.